


retirement plan not included

by beardsley



Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-08
Updated: 2013-01-08
Packaged: 2017-11-24 04:11:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/630236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beardsley/pseuds/beardsley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joan Watson is a retired superhero, and Sherlock keeps dragging her back into the mess.</p>
            </blockquote>





	retirement plan not included

**Author's Note:**

> for [Lacinia](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Lacinia).

It's a boring day. Joan spends most of it filling out reports; she always assumed the work of a private investigator would be packed with danger and excitement, and so far it's been a disappointment. She isn't ready to examine this disappointment too closely, though, not yet. This job was supposed to be boring, wasn't it? It was supposed to be a far cry from her past exploits.

If not the paperwork, then the distinct lack of tights should speak to that.

Except she's absolutely bored, and the lukewarm coffee helps not in the least, but Joan drinks it anyway. She drinks her coffee and fills out her paperwork and steadfastly refuses to miss the things she's not thinking about. At all.

Damn it.

When she hears someone jimmying the lock in her door, she just sighs. If it's a burglar, they're in for a nasty surprise. Joan refuses to feel bad for any wayward criminal, though; they should do their research. If they don't, it's their own fault when Joan punches them into next Sunday.

Except it's not a burglar, of course it isn't. There is a soft, 'Ha!' and Sherlock staggers into her office, smiling smugly. He blinks when he sees Joan, like he wasn't expecting to see her (locked door and all), but then he strikes a pose and points at her with his finger.

'Watson! Excellent, you're not busy. Come with me, your expertise is needed.'

He even makes a vague shooing gesture. Joan doesn't move an inch.

'Tell me, how exactly did you come to the conclusion that I'm not busy?' she asks, raising an eyebrow. 'Is it the pile of documents here that gave me away, or the locked door? Wait, let me guess. It's the do not disturb sign.'

Sherlock sighs, clearly put off by Joan's continued inability to be impressed by his neuroses. 'Your left eyebrow is twitching,' he says, crossing his arms over his chest. 'It's a subtle muscle spasm, one I wouldn't be surprised to discover you're not aware of. But finely-tuned to body language as I am, I can tell you your left eyebrow twitches when you're exceedingly bored.'

'Bored doesn't mean not busy,' Joan points out.

Sherlock frowns. 'Doesn't it?'

Heaving a sigh and resisting the urge to bang her head against the desk (and really, it would just be completely unproductive if she broke it), Joan caps her pen and starts to pack. 'What do you need help with?'

'I don't need help,' Sherlock says doggedly. 'I need your expertise as a retired —'

'Save it. Just tell me what happened.'

'A murder happened, of course, what else?' He looks at her, brow furrowed in confusion. 'Do you need some time to readjust to my pace?'

Joan rubs her temples. 'I might need to readjust your _face_ if you don't shut up,' she mutters.

Sherlock just waves her off.

~

His press pass from the Daily Bugle gets them through the police tape, though the uniform is clearly unhappy about letting them roam around the crime scene. But when he takes a second look at Joan, his eyes go wide and he starts, 'Aren't you the —'

'In the flesh,' Joan cuts him off, and wraps her coat tighter around herself. She thought people might not recognise a C-list super out of costume, and one who has been gone from the business for some time now; she thought wrong.

The crime scene is an alley, with rubbish strewn all over the ground. The only clear space is inside the white chalk outline. As Joan watches, Sherlock lays out eight polaroids. She frowns.

'When did you get access to the body?'

'A friend in the CSU,' Sherlock replies, distracted.

Joan's frown deepens. 'You have friends.'

'Of course I have friends, I have — you know.' Sherlock looks up at her. 'Come now, Watson, don't make me say it, you know I don't deal very well with emotional situations.'

He's actually a little flustered, and it makes Joan smile. 'All right, tell me what you know about the crime.'

'Simon Rodriguez, fourteen,' Sherlock starts, already back to business. But Joan sees the grateful twist to his mouth, and it's enough. 'Found dead at four fifteen in the morning by a pair of drunk college students. Authorities arrived at the scene thirty-four minutes later.'

'And they think it was a super?'

Sherlock nods. 'Neighbourhood canvass gave them accounts of a singular loud noise around the time of death, which they assume to have been a sonic boom. I agree with them, for once. There are a few freshly broken windows, and there is a crack in the pavement at the mouth of the alley consistent with a superfast flier taking off. I think this place might be the dump site, actually, but it is curious to me why a flier would be careless enough to leave such obvious evidence. And then there's the body itself. Here, take a look.'

Joan walks over to peer at the polaroids. Simon Rodriguez looks small, and — well, obviously dead. She'd seen dead bodies before, that part doesn't impress her much. She'd seen dead humans and aliens and even a god, that one time. But children get to her, always have.

What's the point of even having superheroes if kids still die horribly, alone, in back alleys?

'You're quiet,' Sherlock observes. Joan doesn't have the strength to look at his expression. 'Very…quiet. Did you know this boy? What is it? Watson, you know very well I am not a telepath, you're going to have to verbalise eventually.'

'I know how he died,' Joan says, feeling numb.

For a long moment, Sherlock says nothing. Then: 'How?'

She points at the bruises on the boy's torso. 'This is what happens when a speedster or a flier travelling at around two hundred miles an hour slams into you.'

'Oh. Oh!' Sherlock starts snapping his fingers, looking down at the polaroids in growing excitement. 'Perfect, that's perfect — sudden acceleration, with the super not stopping to match velocities — yes, and see, the pattern on the body's left side, it looks like the super tried to _catch_ him, which means he was most likely trying to _save_ him, which means this was…an accident. Watson.'

'Yes.'

'You've seen something like before, haven't you?' Sherlock asks. It's his approximation of trying to sound gentle, and Joan supposes she's grateful for that, a little.

'I have,' she says.

'Is it related to why you quit?' Sherlock pushes, because of course he pushes, he won't ever stop until Joan tells him, that —

That she'd seen one hero too many die. That she'd seen one villain too many get away and live to fight another day, even though it should be the other way around. That she'd become so fed up with the futility, the _pointlessness_ of it all, that it'd taken all of her considerable superstrength to get out of bed in the mornings. That her generic set of superhero abilities, the strength and invulnerability and flight and speed, none of it ever prepared her for losing Carrie, or for any of the other losses. The other defeats.

She knows Sherlock will keep pushing. Maybe a part of her wants him to; wants him to be curious enough to put all his journalistic resources into figuring out her past. But she's not telling him. He probably earned it, by now, but she's not telling him.

He's not a super. He would never understand.

'I've seen this happen with beginners,' Joan says. 'Inexperienced rookies who want to prove themselves. By the time we find the kid, he'll be a guilty mess. He'll want to get caught, because they never told him that superheroics aren't easy, they never told him that accidents happen when you're green, and he won't ever get past this.' She sighs, and sticks her hands in her pockets.

'I notice your use of plural first person as opposed to third,' Sherlock says, raising his eyebrows. He gets up and dusts off his pants, and keeps looking at Joan in a way that kind of makes her want to slam his head into the wall.

'A super did this,' she says. 'A super should bring them in. It's the least we can do.'

'The police are quite trigger-happy when it comes to perpetrators with superpowers,' Sherlock agrees. 'Although to be perfectly honest, I suspect our inexperienced rookie might be more traumatised when it is you of all people who shows up at his door, Ms —'

'Don't call me that,' Joan snaps. Really. Head into wall, it wouldn't take a second.

Sherlock just waves her off.


End file.
